The Alien Invasion Has Begun!

NO NO NO! Not that alien invasion! That one began a long time ago and – from what I’m seeing around Southern California – is nearly complete! You presumed I meant the invasion of our streams and rivers by the New Zealand Mud Snail, right?

No, I’m talking about the other, sinister alien invasion! Like from outer space is what I mean!

You know – the one where they come down to our planet, and secretly infiltrate our civilization while they begin to learn our customs, our ways…and our weaknesses.

Perhaps using some sort of money-ray…

…Perhaps using some sort of money-ray – just like that [see above] – they manage to bankroll enough dough-re-mi to establish a manufacturing concern so that they might interact with us on various levels of society, from the lowliest, filthiest, never-graduated-from-art-school janitor on to the greediest, laziest union assembly-line workers all the way up to the loftiest, highest-minded and wealthiest investors with MBAs from only the finest business schools – to find out how to defeat us.

Now these aliens, they don’t want to call too much attention to their new company, see, so they need a sort of seemingly benign, innocuous, non-descript product.

How about…why, how about a plastic garbage pail! Sure, a waste basket! Perfect!

Now for a name! And this is where they made their fatal mistake. For you see, these invaders have such contempt for you and me – the dominant species on planet Earth – that they couldn’t resist naming their company something condescending and insulting – so confident were they of the imminent destruction of mankind.

I can almost hear the CEO himself, Zoroxx, probably, laughing during a board meeting as he named the company! “Ah ha ha! The stupid people of earth have no idea! I will crush them all and also crumple them up like discarded pieces of paper and toss them asunder, like so many crumpled pieces of paper. Ha ha ha! Simple humans! Ah ha ha ha – hey, wait, that’s great! Let’s use that! Also, Maryanne, sweetheart, get me a latte.”

Thus the company was named!

And it would have happened, too, if it weren’t for a plucky little fella name of Ted – me! – who happened to see this in the grocery store last night and uncover their devious plot.

(For the record, all I did was uncover their devious plot. Someone else still has to actually stop them.)